Choke
by Buckle
Summary: She loves them. She destroys them. 'Wear me like a locket around your throat, I'll weigh you down, I'll watch you choke.' [oneshot. HojoLucreciaVincent love triangle. Set to Nobody Puts Baby In The Corner by Fall Out Boy.]


_Drink down that Gin and Kerosene,  
And come spit on bridges with me,  
Just to keep us warm.  
Light a match to leave me be._

"Vincent?"

A warm breeze brushes across his skin from the open window, and he feels a pleasant shiver from his shoulders to his toes. It has nothing to do with the wind.

"Lucrecia," he said softly.

She smiled, those soft pink lips twisting upwards. In her scientific mind, she remembers that silly rumor that said it took more muscles to frown than to smile. Of course, this was untrue, but as most people smiled often, the muscles were in good shape, so it took less effort. It felt nicer too. So she allowed the door to shut and lock behind her, the feel-good smile on her lips. Lighter than air she brushed over and wrapped her arms around him, pressing her cheek against his bare chest.

"I thought about you all day," she murmured.

He smiled, and bent down slightly to kiss her full on the lips, not bothering to waste his words on what this said so clearly. Her hazel eyes met his as they drew back, and he tucked a stray strand of mousy brown hair behind her ear. "You too, then," she laughed lightly, not loudly.

Vincent looked down at her, blue eyes soft with love and lust at her delicate features and her pale skin. Her hands were soft from their constant coating of latex, but it made them feel rubbery as well, unreal. But on the same hand, he felt the imprint of the wedding ring she always removed when Hojo wasn't around. And it was there, that reminder that she didn't belong to him.

Well, he smirked, holding her closer to him, not legally.

_I keep my jealousy close,  
'Cause it's all mine._

She awoke in the middle of the night, her bare chest pressed against his. She didn't want to leave. She didn't want to stir. Oh, but she must. But oh how'd she love to lie with him all day, lie in this bed all day.

She stirred. Vincent wakened, and his grip around her instinctively tightened, fingers pressing harshly against smooth skin. She could barely tear herself away. Oh, how often she forgot who he really was. How she forgot those fingers that would touch her face and her skin were laced with blood.

But that didn't matter. No, that didn't matter, because she'd met a Turk who could love. That had to be a scientific wonder, no doubt.

His grip loosened. He was awake, but let her slip out and sweep on her nightgown. She knew he wasn't asleep, and he knew that she was aware of the fact, but he lay silent anyways. As she was walking out the door, she heard him, quieter than the wind's whisper. "I love you."

She looked over her shoulder at him.

She smiled.

_And if you say this makes you happy,  
Then I'm not the only one lying._

Lucrecia was sound asleep when he came home from his journey at Midgar. He smiled that crooked smile, the wolf eyeing his prey. He sidles into the bathroom and runs the shower in a futile attempt to wash off the laboratory smells that define him. He dresses in his stiff grey pajamas, and climbs into bed. He wraps arms around her waist, and she stirs.

"…Hojo?" she murmurs, her senses clouded with sleep. But he sees her cheeks move in the way that means she's smiling that small smile of hers.

He gently rests his lips against the pale, smooth crook of her neck, and he doesn't notice when she stiffens.

He once told her, though at the time he hadn't meant to say it, that she smelled like peppermint. Whenever he rested his rough lips against her neck, she knew he was thinking of it, taking in her scent. Yet her body was rigid, because of what he might smell tonight.

He though she smelt like peppermint, but she knew she rank of adultery.

"Peppermint…" he muttered, so low she might have not even heard it.

His eyes glinted like the big bad wolf's, butit was she who was the wolf in lamb's clothing.

_Keep quiet,  
Nothing comes as easy as you._

_Can I lay in your bed all day?_

The work day comes, and relationships die. Hojo and Lucrecia are doctor and assistant, though he is tender to her, and Lucrecia and Vincent are Turk and Mission, though he is softer around her.

Hojo takes an instrument and allows his hand to close over hers.

Vincent passes her and his fingers brush against the soft underside of her wrist.  
_  
I'll be your best kept secret  
And your biggest mistake.  
The hand behind this pen relives a failure every day._

Hojo goes away for the weekend, and Lucrecia lies with Vincent. She lets herself love him because he's beautiful. She lets herself love him because she needs it.

Hojo comes back, and she kisses him on the lips as he walks in the door. She lets herself love him because he's her husband. She lets herself love him because she does.

Well, did.

Now?

She's not so sure.

Vincent watches her greet Hojo from the top of the staircase. Hojo looks up and meets his stony eyes. Their eyes meet, and Hojo's eyes glint with malice.

Vincent turns away, jealousy and anger making his lips tight, and locks himself in his room.

_And I keep my jealousy close,  
'Cause it's all mine._

She loves Vincent, she really does. She does.

Otherwise, she couldn't let their lips meet in the darkness of the gardens.

Otherwise, she couldn't let herself unbutton her shirt for him.

Otherwise, she couldn't let herself scream with him at night.

Correct?

_And if you say this makes you happy,  
Then I'm not the only one lying._

He knows. Lucrecia is jittery. He knows. It's in the glances he sends between her and Vincent. It's in the coldness of his hand as he takes the instrument from her fingers. It's in the malicious grin he sends Vincent's way as he wraps arms around her waist, pressing her back to his chest. She's now something he has that Vincent doesn't. She's a reason to be cruel.

He knows. It's in the way he never rests his lips against her neck. It's in the way the shower won't wash off the rank of adultery. It's in the way her towels make her dirtier. It's in the way that the only way she can be clean is to sweat it off between the sheets. But when she climbs out again, and those lips whisper that he loves her, she's dirty yet again.

He knows. It's in the glares he sends between her and Vincent. It's in the way he snatches the instrument from her fingers. It's in the way grabs her too him, daring Vincent to protest. She's now something that belongs to Hojo by day, and belongs to Vincent by night. She's cruel.

Drink down that Gin and Kerosene,  
And come spit on bridges with me,  
Just to keep us warm.  
Light a match to leave me be.  
Light a match to leave me be.

She comes into his room at night, hair down around her shoulders for once. She tugs at the ruffle on her nightgown collar, pulling the frayed edges. Her soft lips curve into a smile, her eyes look up at him through her long lashes, and she watches as Vincent melts. She pulls herself against his chest, presses her cheek against his bare skin as hot tears spill down her face. He opens his mouth to say something. She presses a finger against his lips.

Keep quiet,

"I love you." She lies.

_  
Nothing comes as easy as you._

Again she lies clean between the sheets and enveloped in his arms. She likes it here. She doesn't love the man who holds her tight by her wedding ring. She knows she doesn't. Her eyes turn up to Vincent, whose chin rests on her head. She buries her face in his chest. She doesn't want to leave.

She likes it here.

_  
Can I lay in your bed all day?  
I'll be your best kept secret  
And your biggest mistake.  
The hand behind this pen relives a failure every day._

The door bursts open. He's here. He's early.

Vincent doesn't let her go, but he is awake, his gun drawn and sitting upright before Lucrecia blinks. One arm holds her to his side, her hair tickling their bare shoulders. Hojo is furious. But he'd known.

It's too far gone for him to be hurt.

_So wear me like a locket around your throat.  
_

Lucrecia looks at his face. She doesn't know him anymore. It's contorted into rage and fury. This project has made him into someone she doesn't know.

Then again.

She wears the perfume of sins and another man's bed sheets. She drifted further away, and the colder her husband become. The more their union faded, the crueler he became. Crueler at work; crueler at home.

Had there ever been a difference between the two for them?

The project maybe had something to do with it, yes. But it is Lucrecia; it is she who turned him into this. It was she who grabbed his ends and twisted him, wrung him out. It was she. She who has distorted him into a man she doesn't know. She's turned him into a man she doesn't love.

_I'll weigh you down.  
I'll watch you choke._

He yanks her by her bicep and she stumbles out of bed, her long fingers clutching the cleansing sheets to her body. Hojo screams at Vincent and her, his words lost in the roar of his voice, lost to the roar in his head. He shrieked at her, and he drags her out of the room before Vincent moves.

His hand draws back, high above her huddled form.

His hand, cold and calloused, stings her face, biting as his draws across it.

For the first time since she'd known him, her husband had smacked someone.

He had smacked her.

Vincent hears, and there is a bang and a bullet hole in the door. Vincent yanks the door open. Hojo throws her against him.

"You'll pay Turk." He spits out at Vincent.

He looks coldly at his wife, who found out she was pregnant a week ago.

_You'll pay, whore_.

Hojo stalks off, and Vincent hugs to him and strokes the thing that is destroying him.

So wear me like a locket around your throat.  
I'll weigh you down.  
I'll watch you choke.  
You look so good in blue.  
You look so good in blue.

The next day, the three are cold to each other. Lucrecia shows Hojo the test he'd already found in the bathroom wastebasket. That same evening, he suggests using it for the project.

His cold, beetle black eyes meet hers harshly. People would wonder how he could do this to his wife's child.

She knew.

She cannot say no.

She couldn't say no.

After all, if she did she might have to face Hojo's hate as the baby came out, not knowing whose baby it was. She didn't want to meet his eyes if the child grew up with those bright blue eyes when neither she, Hojo nor any of their parents had the recessive gene. So she couldn't say no.

She couldn't say no. She couldn't live life having her husband hate her baby. Because he would, she knew. She looked at his cold, malicious eyes and she knew.

So she couldn't say no. She wanted to give him a reason to love her baby, if only for love of science.

So, you see, she couldn't say no.

What's more, she doesn't _want_ to.

She accepts. For the first time in months, Hojo smiled. A twisted, sinister and malicious smile that crept across his features unpleasantly. He knew how to get what he wanted.

She smiles. It is false. But as she thinks of all they'd gone through, she is beginning to believe her soft, innocent smile is more dangerous than his malicious one. Far more dangerous.

Destructive, even.

_  
So wear me like a locket around your throat.  
I'll weigh you down.  
I'll watch you choke.  
You look so good in blue.  
You look so good in blue._

She smiles at Vincent as he reads under a tree. She walks up to him, blocking his sun and forcing him to look up. Seeing him in his Turk uniform in this bright sunlight is a change. Normally it is in the dank of a laboratory, or in a heap on the floor. Her hands clasp behind her back, fingers of opposite hands intertwining. He is trying not to look at her. There is pain in his eyes. He loves her.

She loves him.

Correct?

"Hello." She says.

"Hello." He says. Stiffly.

"You look good in blue." She tells him.

He looks up at her. He is hurt. His blue eyes are cold. "And you look good in red."

He leaves._  
_

_So wear me like a locket around your throat.  
I'll weigh you down.  
I'll watch you choke.  
You look so good in blue.  
You look so good in blue. _

Her stomach is large. She is sweating from the pain of the contractions. Hojo stands by her cold, metal delivering table. He lets the nurse hold her hand. Hours later, she was still there, screeching fit to tear a building down. Were all deliveries so painful, or was it the JENOVA cells? She would have to investigate later, factoring in her baby's weight, width and height and her own to compare it to others.

Eventually it comes out, and she peers at her feet. What color was its hair?

What color were its eyes?

She stretches her arms out in maternal instinct.

The baby never cries.

_  
(Keep quiet,  
Nothing comes as easy as you._

Hojo glances at her. He is holding the baby in glee – the glee of seeing a new subject, fresh with possibilities - but when his eyes land on her they are hard. Stones set in a crooked face, black but reflecting no light. The malicious, twisted and evilly triumphant smirk he usually saves for Vincent comes her way.

"…My baby?" she says weakly, arms outstretched pitifully. "My Sephiroth?"

He gives her one last disgusted look. "Your repayment, whore." He spits.

He leaves.

She lies alone on her cold, metallic bed.

_  
Can I lay in your bed all day?_

She hears the steps she's come to associate with Vincent. Her weak heart leaps, fluttering pulse growing stronger. He's coming for her! But as she peers through the open doorway, he passes her. He never looks her way.

There. Once glance.

His eyes are hard.

She lies flat.

She never see his eyes soften.

Hot tears spill out her eyes.

You could only weigh a man down so much before he started to choke.

_  
You look so good in blue.  
You look so good in blue.) _

She can hear voices, but her fading conscious can barely distinguish them. One is her lover's, and one is her husband's. She had belonged to both, she knew, and they had accepted her willingly.

_  
(So wear me like a locket around your throat._

She was a lamb. She was good.

But she had worn them down, eating her way out of the sheepskin.

_  
I'll weigh you down. _

The unmistakable sound of a gunshot erupted through the air laced with heaviness and pain. She heard a baby coo, her husband's malicious, twisted and biter laughter ringing through her head as she heard her lover fall with a thump to the ground.

Then she had destroyed them.

_I'll watch you choke._

Finally she had destroyed herself.

_  
You look so good in blue._

She took a rasping breath and in that moment, she was lain out to the world, all wolf teeth and lamb eyes.

One last shuddering breath.

Lamb eyes shut.

_You look so good in blue._

Wolf teeth remained.

_You look so good in…blue.)_

--

**A/N:**

So? Good? Bad? What the heck?

Hmm. I heard this song and, my ever dorky mind thought - wow, this would work well in FF7. So, I started thinking. And then, pondering who to use, it hit me like _POW_! This would be perfect for the Hojo-Lucrecia-Vincent triangle.

About the actual **_story _**first:

-I warped the song lyrics a bit to suit me. Forgive me.

-Hope you understood the 'And you look good in red.'

-There are some very obvious and other more subtle hints to Lucrecia's feelings on Vincent. Thinking of one sorta-subtle hint in particular.

-I see Lucrecia as a very mixed up person. Because, I remember thinking the ting that struck me about her character was that she doesn't seem like she would cheat. Not the type. So I try to make her sound confused, mixed up - lost.

-_My_ take on the Hojo-Lucrecia-Vincent triangle. Don't tell me how it doesn't follow the new DOC games or anything right, becaus I know. Also don't tell me that it doesn't follow even the FF7 scenario right because...well...I know. For one, my brother either hoarded or lost out PS2, which I half owned, so I haven't seen it in a while and two, for this story, I don't know how well that would have worked. My take, as I said.

Anyway...I think there might be the feeling here I don't like Lucrecia very much. Well. I think too often she's potrayed as the little innocent one as Hojo is cruel and Vincent is the righteous lover. But I really don't think that was how it went. She cheated on her _husband_, remember? But as I said, I see her as mixed up. I really love her character, her story. But it's not one of the characters you're like 'ahhh, love that guy/girl. Nyuk, Nyuk.'

I'm almost positive they named Lucrecia after Lucretia (I used to misspell her name that way) from the historical figure Lucretia, int he Roman story of The Rape of Lucrecia. In this story, the son of the last Roman king raped the noblewoman Lucretia, and she gathered the men in her family and commited suicide to regain her honor. It was her rape and suicide that prompted a **civil war**

Significant, no?

I checked wikipedia (I know, not the most reliable source) and it did credit her naming after this figure. Wikipedia also says "The Lucrecia in _Final Fantasy VII_ was also exploited to great and tragic effect by the Shinra Corporation; incidentally, the second kanji in "Shinra" is often used to represent Rome in Japanese. "

Oh gosh, I'll end this ginormous author's note now (probably as long as the story). I just really like Lucrecia's story. Sorry about this no doubt boring A/N.


End file.
